One good example of a dead drop can be found in the movie Enemy of the State. In this movie, in order to contact the private investigator/former NSA operativeBrill, the protagonist is told to draw a line with chalk on a mailbox, and then leave the package with the data to be sent underneath a specific seat on a ferry. The chalking of the mailbox acts as a signal to the contact, letting him know to check the dead drop, and by placing the material in a place where it is unlikely to be looked for (and where the receiving contact has private or semi-private access) it's safety is insured - and neither contact knows the appearance or identification of the other.

Another example of a dead drop can be seen in the TV show The X-Files. When Mulder needs to contact X he marks his window with tape in the shape of an X. This signals to X that Mulder desires a meeting at the predeclared location.

al-Qaeda operatives working in Britain came up with a method using an e-mail account to pass information - by sharing the mailbox password among the contacts, messages could be left for each member of the cell by writing the message and saving it as a draft - this way the e-mail never was actually transmitted and therefore could not be intercepted.

The downside of most dead drop ideas are that many times the data must be left in a public or semi-public place - and therefore can be compromised if the area is under surveillance.